One Bat, Two Bat, Mean Bat, Zubat
by many form man
Summary: With the recent establishment of a Sinnoh Ranger School, people of all ages and all lifestyles gather to apply to the school, all for their own reasons. Some to prove themselves as a person, some to make the world better for people and Pokemon alike. This story is not about any of those losers. Instead, it recounts the tales of one girl, whose only goal is to hunt those dang bats.


Ten minutes. Thaddeus couldn't believe it had been ten minutes; six hundred whole seconds past the appointment time, and neither hide nor hair of his interviewee. Such insolence was simply outrageous. He reasoned, though, that he shouldn't be as surprised as he was; the Ranger headquarters had just recently been established in Eterna City, so there were bound to be _some_ idiots who ended up forgetting about their interviews.

Despite that, he had better things to be doing; not sitting in a dark, isolated room waiting for some no-show, for instance. He'd rather be doing his taxes than this; at least the dark, isolated room in which he did his taxes came with some way to kill his time!

He was about to reach for his phone to demand some taxes to do, when he heard a door creak open. His eyes darted to the room's sole door, and he expected his gaze to meet with the visage of a respectably-dressed young lady.

What it instead met was a short and androgynous individual, dressed in garish colors matched by an equally garish hair color, slinking into the room. Thaddeus cleaned his glasses and rubbed his eyes, but when he looked again, the individual not only remained in his line of sight, but was now sitting in the chair across from his desk. It only then occurred to him that the person before him was his interviewee.

Well, this'd just be oodles of fun.

Thaddeus cleared his throat and returned his eyes to the registration form in front of himself. "Name?"

"Mari Isusi," the interviewee answered, in a distinctly feminine voice. Well, that answered the question of her gender, Thaddeus supposed.

"Age?"

"I'm 12."

"A bit young to be applying for a ranger school, aren't we?"

Mari shrugged in reply. "If 10-year-olds can stop the destruction of the world, why can't a 12-year-old start to learn how?"

Thaddeus grunted in reply, though a hint of a smile appeared upon his aged face. He looked down at her application for a quick reminder of her name. "So, Yanamari–"

"Mari."

"Whatever, kid," Thaddeus laughed with a dismissive wave of his hand, causing Mari to pout at him with the fury of a thousand pouting children. "Anyway, why do you want to be a ranger?"

As if on cue, Mari launched out of her seat, now standing atop it. She raised a fist and declared to nobody in particular, "I am on a mission!"

"Fascinating," Thaddeus replied, nodding, "now why don't you tell me all about it while sitting back down in that chair like a good girl?"

Mari sighed as she slumped back into a sitting position. "Anyway, my mission is to rid the world of the Zubat menace!"

"I beg your pardon?" her interviewer asked, adjusting his glasses.

"You heard me!" she declared with much bravado, pumping her fist into the air again. "Zubats are a menace that must be dealt with; they constantly trouble adventurers on their way through caves for no good reason!"

"And where did you hear such tales?"

"I have experienced it first hand; Mount Coronet was infested with them as I walked here!"

Thaddeus could only stare. "Ms. Isusi, where do you live?"

Mari looked at him, confused. "I'm from Snowpoint, why?"

"Then you came here with your parents, I assume?"

"Nope! By myself."

His extended silence left Mari to assume she was allowed to continue her long-winded rant on the evils of Zubats, and she proceeded to do just that. Thaddeus ignored her conspiracy theories, however, and tried to wrap his mind around how far this preteen had travelled, and what she travelled through, just to get there.

"Furthermore, Zubats are responsible for global warming, due to–" Mari rambled on, before stopping when Thaddeus suddenly stood. He extended his hand, which she slowly clasped and shook, more than a bit confused.

"Welcome to the Sinnoh Ranger School," he stated sagely.

"But I wasn't even finished talking about the evils of Zu–"

"Look, nobody cares about the Zubats." Mari pouted, but Thaddeus ignored her and continued, "If you can make it through that mountain by yourself, you have the abilities that one needs to qualify as a ranger."

Thaddeus approached the door, telling Mari as he passed, "Anyway, you're free to stay here, since classes are to start soon anyway. Let me show you to your room, and we'll soon send a convoy to your home for anything you may need."

Mari shrugged. "It's not too much of a problem; most of my wardrobe is like this, anyway."

Thaddeus looked back at Mari, examining her outfit up and down, and couldn't help but ask, "Why that outfit in particular?"

"So that I blend in with the Zubats, of course! I must become one with their ranks so that I can dismantle their forces from within."

A realization dawned upon the interviewer. "Please don't tell me that's why you dyed your hair purple."

"That's exactly it!" Mari beamed, puffing out her chest in victory. "You catch on quickly, mister, uh–"

"Thaddeus," he answered, in between rubbing his wrinkled forehead. However, as the aged ranger tried to comprehend the girl before him, another realization dawned upon him. "Ms. Isusi?"

"Yes?" she asked, hiding some sort of blueprint behind her back.

Thaddeus ignored the conspicuous roll of paper that was sprouting out a good few inches above her head, and he continued, "You walked all the way here from Snowpoint."

"Yessir."

"With no supplies."

"That's right."

"And don't want any sent to you."

"Don't need them."

He paused, wondering whether he really wanted to know the answer to his own question. "Ms. Isusi, how long have you been wearing that exact set of clothes."

Mari put a finger to her chin in thought, looking at the empty ceiling, then the empty floor, then finally the walls full of unfunny motivational posters, before answering, "A couple weeks, I think?"

Thaddeus resisted the temptation to gag.

* * *

Mari found herself in the room in which she was to stay soon afterward. She remembered Thaddeus keeping a good distance away from her and covering his nose as he led her there. However, the joke was on him, thought she; she wasn't into older men, anyway! Or relationships at all, really, but that was beside the point.

She lay on her bed and stared at the ceiling, pondering what else the senior ranger had told her. Interviews for other potential rangers over the next couple days, orientation shortly after that, and her supplies would be delivered to her at some point. She didn't need much convincing to get some supplies sent to her after remembering what she had back at home.

She thought of the Zubat-patterned dartboard hung up in her room; how it would soon be back in her grasp, and she smiled fondly. She was whisked away to sleep on such pleasant thoughts: the thoughts of impaling those dirty flying rodents with her large plethora of darts.


End file.
